The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of hydrangea that is grown for use as an indoor floral potted plant and an outdoor ornamental flowering shrub. The new cultivar is known botanically as Hydrangea macrophylla and will be referred to hereinafter by the cultivar name ‘RIE 13’.
‘RIE 13’ resulted from a breeding program that was conducted by the inventor at the inventor's nursery in Kyoto, Japan and began in 1990. The purpose of the breeding program was to produce new varieties of floral potted hydrangeas that exhibit new and unique flowers and flower color.
Between May 1990 and May 1993 the inventor assembled a collection of unnamed and unreleased hybrids from a sequence of deliberate pollinations involving the following cultivars, all unpatented, and available in commerce in Japan: Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Otafuku’, Hydrangea macrophylla, ‘Yamaajisai’, and Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Fijinishiritaki’. The inventor did not record which variety was used as male parent and which as female parent. In May 1993, the inventor carried out a deliberate pollination between one unnamed plant from the inventor's collection as female parent and the variety Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Sumidanohanabi’ (unpatented) as male parent.
The pollination described above produced thirty-five individual varieties, which the inventor considered novel and unusual. One of these individual varieties was selected by the inventor in June 1994 and is the subject of the present invention, ‘RIE 13’.
‘RIE 13’ is a deciduous shrub that exhibits large dark grey-green leaves and individual fertile flowers which carry bi-colored pink and light purple bracts. ‘RIE 13’ is distinguishable from the parent plants by flower color, and unique inflorescence development, which produces an average of 600 fertile flowers per inflorescence. Of these 600 flowers, some 450 flowers carry the bi-colored bracts. No sterile flowers are present. The closest cultivar of hydrangea known to the inventor is the inventor's variety Hydrangea ‘RIE 09’ (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 16,613). Whereas ‘RIE 13’ bears only fertile flowers, many with colored bracts, ‘RIE 09’ bears both sterile flowers and fertile flowers whose bracts are uniformly pink.
‘RIE 13’ was first asexually propagated by the inventor, in the spring of 1995 in a cultivated area of Kyoto, Japan. The method used for asexual propagation was softwood cuttings. The characteristics of the new Hydrangea cultivar named ‘RIE 13’ have been determined stable and are reproduced true to type in successive generations.